If your child likes to hold onto plane tickets during a family vacation, do not indulge this power struggle. One adult should hold all tickets at all times. And someone at home should have copies of passports and visas.

Traveling with kids doesn't have to be difficult, provided you follow a few simple rules. The first is listed above: one adult and one adult only should be in charge of all important papers.

Now, a few more:

Where to sit

If your child is out of diapers, do yourself a favor and get seats in  the rear of the plane, near the bathroom.  Nothing pisses off your fellow passengers more than a kid who needs to keep going down the aisle, bumping elbows and stepping on feet, because he has to go potty once again.

On the other hand, if your child is a kicker (and you know who you are) make sure to snag that bulkhead seat.  People get REALLY annoyed when the person behind them kicks for seven or eight hours, no matter that his dimples and curly hair make him irresistible.  

Window vs aisle?

While there is something to be said for the ability to look out the window when you are landing, this occupies only a few minutes of what can be a multi-hour flight.  Unless you are taking up the whole row and can switch seats with your child so she can have the window seat for landing, you don't want your kid to have to climb over a stranger for the bathroom/exercise break/bordeom run down the aisle.

Medicate or no?

My sister and her husband, both doctors, always somehow detected a sniffle in their kids just before boarding, necessitating a narcotizing dose of Benadryl. The antihistamine works as a sedative, knocking the kids out for the duration of the flight. Unfortunately for me, Benadryl has the opposite effect on my kids, hyper-ing them into a frenzy.  If you want to medicate, consider a trial run.

Baby food

Glass baby food jars are so 2009.  Plum Organics has pureed fruit in pouches.  The JUST line of 100 percent fruit, with no added sugar, juice, color or flavor, includes six varieties:  apple, peach, banana, pear, prune and mango.  The apple can be served to an older child as an applesauce snack, and the mango or peach is great added to a smoothie at home.  But on  an airplane, you'll appreciate that you can squeeze a little fruit onto a spoon and feed the baby without waste.  Since you are not dipping a spoon into the pouch, any uneaten food can be saved and served later.

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